Night Vision

Night Vision level layout concept. Here I sketched out the game in the colours I wanted each section to embody.

The first thing the player sees is a very dark blue, this gives the player the first inkling that they will have to proceed slowly. The purpose of the game was to have the player take their time, by purposely making the space dark the player needs to carefully look for the next pool of light.

I understood that being in an all dark space can be very anxiety provoking and I wanted the player to feel like they had some control over the environment so I created a light gun that players could shoot. This created small orbs of light that temporarily showed the player the way or if there was an obstacle but it also destroyed their night vision for a short time, making it easy to miss the next clue.

Thus a player that constantly used the light gun might find themselves more lost than they were at the beginning.

The start of each section established the colour and gave you a point of reference if you ever got turned around.

The end of the level does away with the bright and artificial looking lighting and instead emphasizes bright natural light. Most players mentioned feeling a palatable sense of relief once they came to this part.

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Description

This was the first time I used the Unreal 4 engine and I was fascinated by it’s realistic “Night Vision” adjustment on the camera. As I have a background in Lighting Design I took the opportunity uses this feature and design the project with a heavy emphasis on the theatrical aspect of lighting.

The point of the game is to play it in complete darkness, the same as if you were an audience member at a show, and carefully use your sight to make your way out of the maze. There is no combat and your only tool is a nerf gun that shoots bright balls of light, which quickly fade away.